


Attune with Aether

by Mertiya



Series: Story Circle [17]
Category: Magic: The Gathering
Genre: Accidental Bonding, Canon Compliant, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Guilt, Kaladesh, Making friends in unusual places, Missing Scene, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Spoilers for In the Dead of Night
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-02
Updated: 2016-12-02
Packaged: 2018-09-03 16:57:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,544
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8721565
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mertiya/pseuds/Mertiya
Summary: Jace finds himself in the role of mentor in a way he isn't expecting and watches a sunrise.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to paperclipminimizer and Camille especially, as well as everyone else on Sketchydoodles' Vorthos server, and Allison Luhrs for giving us the gift that is Yahenni.

            _Blinding pain, the stench of cooking flesh, the screams of the dying—_

Jace Beleren sat up with a sobbing gasp, pressing the palms of his hands into his eyes. It was a nightmare he was only too familiar with, but not one he would ever quite be able to rid himself of, he suspected. He drew his knees up to his chest, muttering a manaflow formula to himself, trying to focus on where he was now and pull himself out of the horrors of the past.

            It wasn’t enough. The scratchy bedspread beneath his legs, the scents of lingering spices, even the heavy humidity in the air—all of it was fundamentally _not home_. He needed something more to anchor himself. So he pressed his hands harder against his eyes and reached out with his mind—gently, just enough to feel the shape of minds around him, but not enough to actually see their thoughts or dreams.

            First he felt the shifting, fiery brightness of Chandra, then the shining, rock-solid comfort of Gideon. He spent a moment testing his connection with Nissa, which wasn’t wholly of his own making, and which pushed back gently when he pushed against it. That helped. His breathing started to steady, as he was able to tell himself, _You’re on Kaladesh. You’re helping Chandra. You’re going to go home soon._ _You’re fine._

Letting his head fall back against the pillow, he threw out one last quick mental check, just to be sure there was no cause for alarm. Liliana was awake—on watch—and he shied away from the all-too-familiar brush of her mind a little too quickly, pulling back as if he’d touched a hot stove.

            _I killed them._ That mind was new and took Jace a moment to place. Yahenni, Chandra’s friend, who’d come to warn them earlier in the day. The aetherborn. He’d been on Kaladesh long enough to know that aetherborn didn’t sleep, so wasn’t exactly surprised that they were awake. But they weren’t just awake. Even that brief thought was tinged with guilt and pain and—well, a lot of the things Jace had woken up feeling.

            Maybe he should go back to sleep. Maybe they wouldn’t appreciate the intrusion. But somehow, he didn’t like to go back to sleep again when somebody was—hurting. Jace knew he wasn’t Gideon or Nissa. He didn’t know what to say or how to comfort someone. But maybe he’d be better than nothing.

            He found Yahenni seated in front of the tiny, soot-stained window. Their knees were curled up to their chest, and they looked up as he approached.

            “I, um,” Jace said. “Are you okay? I heard—you seemed—”

            They didn’t seem particularly perturbed. “Oh, darling, don’t worry about me,” they said. “I’m just processing a lot.”

            “Mind if I…” Jace waved a hand at the empty spot on the windowseat beside them.

            “Go ahead.”

            They sat in silence for a few moments. Then Jace took a deep breath. “I know how you feel,” he said awkwardly.

            Yahenni cocked their head at him. “Well, you are a mind mage, are you not?” The words sounded light but came out curiously flat.

            “No, I mean. I mean I know how you feel because I’ve felt it, too. I—” He took a deep breath. He hadn’t really shared this particular experience with many people. “When I was seventeen, I made the extremely poor decision to join a group called the Infinite Consortium, which I’ve regretted pretty much since I set my foot in the door. I got away, but—I was running from them, through a crowd of people, and I summoned a drake to attack the people I was running from, but I—” he swallowed. Talking about this was harder than he’d expected it to be. “—I didn’t think about what I was doing. I was just trying to protect myself, but it didn’t just attack the conspirators, it got everyone.” Jace shut his eyes. “E-Every person in the street. And I was in their heads, so I felt them die.” He sighed. “I didn’t mean to, but I killed them to save my own life.”

            “I see.” Yahenni was looking at him quietly. “It hurt, didn’t it?” they asked, after a moment.

            Jace nodded.

            “Did it ever stop hurting?”

            “I don’t think about it all the time.” Jace played with a loose thread on his cloak. “But sometimes I dream about it.” He managed a smile. “That’s not a problem I think you’re going to have.”

            There were a few more moments of silence, and Jace wondered if he’d said the wrong thing, but Yahenni spoke again. “I’ve always known I could take it if I wanted to—people’s essence. But I never thought I _would_.” They shut their eyes. “But they were hurting Nived—I thought they were going to kill him. The man is a _brilliant_ caterer, and the enforcer was just going to snuff him out. Just like—” they snapped their fingers. “So I killed them instead.” Yahenni brushed a stray dust particle off of their shoulder. “I was dying,” they said. “I was dying, and that enforcer gave me twelve days. The one that I killed in front of here—they gave me eleven days. I was dying and I have _twenty-two days_ left, now. I suppose that doesn’t sound like much to you.”

            “Maybe not right now,” Jace returned, “but there were times when I thought that I only had hours left. Twenty-two days would have seemed like an eternity.”

            They nodded jerkily. “It’s hard to be born and see so little of how _much_ there is to see! So much beauty and wonder and _feeling_ in the world, and we only get to see a few years’ worth. And now I have another twenty-two days, but I got that twenty-two days by stealing _their_ experiences. Stealing their lives.” Yahenni pressed their face into their hands.

            Jace couldn’t find anything to say, so instead, he put out an awkward hand and gingerly laid it on their shoulder. Gideon would do that, wouldn’t he? Maybe he would have asked first. But Jace felt no opposition, only a surge of gratitude, and he—well, he just _wasn’t_ Gideon. Maybe he should stop trying to be.

            Yahenni leaned sideways against him. “It’s almost dawn,” they said. “Share this with me, darling.”

            The horizon was glowing faintly. “All right.” Jace shifted slightly into a more comfortable position and gingerly put an arm around Yahenni’s shoulders, doing a quick mental double-check to make sure they didn’t mind.

            They didn’t. The physical contact was comforting. Reassured, Jace settled down, looking out at the horizon. Already, some orange was showing above the relentless lights of the city. Even with the Consulate-mandated curfews, there were still a plethora of bright lights scattered everywhere, turning the night sky inky black above them. Jace still didn’t know if there were stars on Kaladesh.

            The light changed slowly, barely perceptible. Pinky orange bled into the clouds above the horizon; then white light caught in them, reflecting outwards, turning their insides to spun silver. Finally, the sun itself began to rise, and Jace caught his breath. There was something so hopeful about the sight of it, rising across the sprawling city, illuminating sparkling metal, shining concrete, and glittering aether. For a moment, the world inverted, and Jace had a fleeting image of a similar view, seen from even higher up, the wind whistling in his ears, but it was gone almost as soon as it had come.

            Beside him, Yahenni sighed a deep, contented sigh. “Thank you ever so much,” they murmured. “It’s always beautiful, but it’s more beautiful with someone who’s never seen it before.”

            “You’re welcome.” Jace rubbed sleep-crusted eyes and yawned. “Thanks for showing it to me.”

            “Anytime, darling.” They shifted away and looked at him curiously. “Have you forgiven yourself?”

            “Um.” Jace tugged uneasily on his cloak. “I…I don’t know,” he said, finally, honestly. “I guess, at one level, I feel like I _shouldn’t_. But on another level, I know there’s nothing I can do but try to make things better for the people who are still alive. I still wake up from nightmares about the things I’ve done, and I still don’t know if I’m doing the right thing, and sometimes I definitely feel like I should have died several years ago. Sometimes I don’t. Is that forgiveness? I don’t know.”

            “You’ve seen so much.” Yahenni turned on the windowseat and folded their hands in their lap. “You’ve been alive for so much longer than I have, and you’ve experienced so many more things than I ever will, and I envy you for that. Part of me doesn’t care how awful the things were that you’ve experienced, I just want the time to experience them. And part of me—I’m not sure I know.” They stretched as well. “Maybe I don’t need to know yet. I have twenty-one days to work it out.” They flashed Jace a warm feeling, the mental equivalent of a smile, and if it was just a little bit forced, he wasn’t going to comment. “Now, shall we get started on this glorious day, darling?”

            He held out a hand. “Whenever you’re ready.”


End file.
